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Can you please help me create training lessons within the module called "INNOVATIVE PR & MARKETING TOOLKIT". This is module 7 in the FASHION LAUNCH CATALYST programme: https://www.janemcmillan.com/feafla

The following are modules from my previous programme, The 3X Fashion Launch Formula. Please use these modules as a base but delete unnecessary and add what you know about PR and marketing going much more in depth to the important areas

Fashion Launch Catalyst is specifically for the designers who are already in business. They know the basics but don't know how to promote and sell.

This programme goes much more in depth into launching, promotion, PR & marketing than the 3X Fashion Launch Formula and this module 7 is possibly the most important module in the entire programme.

I will verbally teach it live (and then use the recordings as lessons) so it needs to be as a script. It must be engaging and I will also include homework and workbooks to help them understand it more clearly, learn more in depth and faster.

Here are my original modules:

Module 7 Lesson 1

INTRODUCTION TO PR & MARKETING

Earlier you learned the importance of building your audience BEFORE you finish your fantabulous designs and how to start building a community of like-minded people based around their LIFESTYLE and not your specific product. Earlier you identified your core values, those of your customers and pulled out those VALUES that you both share. Its these SHARED VALUES that you build most of your content around. When you have an audience, not only will they be excitedly waiting for your launch, they can also help you design the right products that they really want to buy.

For example here are three ways to know if your product will sell:

RESEARCH: Research what your customers (or potential customers) are buying and how much they pay. Research in their feeds, are they sharing their purchases? Ask them - Do a live or post a fun gif asking what their recent favourite purchase was.
ASK: Ask your customers for feedback - Show them hints of your garments evolving (in a live or images) and see what interest you get. A live video is great for this where you can really talk through the design - why you created it, the inspiration behind it, the fabric you used, highlight the details etc and ask them to pop a heart in the DM’s if they like love it. etc. etc. Be original and authentic on lives and you will soon have LOADS of raving fans!!
TEST: Start with just a few items and test by selling to your audience on social media or email list.

Now we’re going to delve deeper into the big ocean of Marketing and PR !!

You can’t market without doing a little PR, and you can’t do PR without a little marketing. Social media marketing has blurred the difference between Marketing and PR because it sits right in the middle but as a small fashion company trying to tackle marketing and PR yourself don’t worry too much about what you call it..... Just do it!

Firstly let’s talk about what marketing is:

Marketing is about promoting and selling your products. It supports the sales team and handles advertising. Your marketing results are measurable as an ROI (return on investment) by comparing how much you spent on the campaign to the profit you made from sales. It could include things like:

Creating an advertising campaign for your new collection & generating a buzz… OR…
Buying advertising slots FOR that campaign.
Creating supporting materials, like brochures and website LANDING pages.
Carrying out RESEARCH to help drive the direction of your campaigns..OR…
Drafting a weekly newsletter for your clients.

PR (Public Relations) is basically EVERYTHING you do in the public eye that reinforces a favourable consciousness of your brand. PR supports your overall brand and handles the press. It's not an advert or promotion… And it’s not just about writing a press release and spamming journalists . (Please DON'T do that!). It’s a more farsighted strategy of hyping your brand at every opportune moment. That could be:

How you promote yourself when posting on social media or speaking to your customers.
Building relationships with the media.
How you execute your product launch.
What strategies you use to drive engagement.
Your content and messaging. (More about that later)
It could be booking exhibition space.
Writing a press release.
Pitching stories about upcoming events…

Before creating your PR plan you firstly need to have considered all of the INGREDIENTS you already learned in modules 1 & 2. If you’re not sure then go over those again. You will need to be really clear about these 12 areas:

Your core VALUES, beliefs and principles. How you talk about yourself and what you do. Your customers values and your SHARED VALUES.

Your ELEVATOR PITCH/statement? This should be really concise and take no more than about 30 seconds to say. It should be written in simple language so that even a 10 year old would under-stand what you do.

Your why, your MISSION / higher purpose ? Why does your company exist. A higher purpose or mission helps build connection with your audience , for example if you design childrenswear your mission might be to help create a better future for children.

Your BRAND STORY (Someone should be able to understand what you are about just from your branding. In fact if your content could successfully represent another designer it's not good enough. It must be unique so that when people see your website, garments, social media, newsletters, videos, blogs, vlogs or whatever they immediately identify it with you.

SEO (Search Engine Optimisation) should be set up on your website. What phrases are your customers searching? You can find research tools on google to carry out some Keyword research. Having a BLOG on your website can really help with this. Come up with a strategy to create and share unique, authentic & relevant content. Blogs are great way to help with SEO because they keep your website fresh & current and keeps people on there for longer.

Your business GOALS and objectives?

The top places you would like your brand to be seen.

Your COMMUNICATION OBJECTIVES. How do you want your company portrayed in the media?

The social media or print media you aim to target.

Your target audience/ IDEAL CUSTOMER AVATAR (ICA)

Where they hang out? Are they on social media? Are they on facebook, instagram, Pinterest, etc.

Your USP (unique selling point) that makes you different from your competitors?

What’s genuine and unique about your brand that will make somebody follow you and eventually become a customer?

You also need a few specific materials to hand: It actually might be a good idea to create a DIGITAL MARKETING TOOLKIT as a folder in Dropbox or The Cloud titled “marketing kit” to store these for easy access. (If you have raw footage it might get too big to store on your computers hard drive).

YOUR DIGITAL MARKETING TOOLKIT CHECKLIST:

BIOGRAPHY: No more than about 150 words. It is useful to have this pre-prepared in your marketing kit so that you can quickly access it and just change to suit different platforms /purposes as required.

HEADSHOTS: A variety of quality images in both portrait and landscape formats is useful to have in your kit for quick access to add to social media posts or provide to press etc.

CREATIVE PHOTOGRAPHY: For each new launch you will want to do a photoshoot. If you are just starting out there’s no need to hire an expensive photographer. Just get creative with your phone

PRODUCT SHOTS: These are photographs of your products to send to the press or to upload to your e-commerce site. These should just be on a plain transparent or white background. Don't send high res images until requested and, in fact it's probably better to add download links instead. If you are just starting out and doing the photoshoots yourself you can drape a white sheet over a clothes rail to achieve a plain background, or even just attach a large piece of paper to a wall or even a tree etc!! If you have a plain white wall in your home that gets good daylight you can use that. At some point you will want to invest in some good lighting.

VIDEOS of work in progress, behind the scenes, your photoshoot etc. Keep behind the scenes raw footage handy in your digital marketing toolkit ready to be edited for your content. Just use the camera on your phone. You can also use make some entertaining tik tok videos or IG reels to get eyeballs on your brand. You don’t have to create Hollywoodesque movies. For IG reels or tik tok people actually DON’T want it to be polished & over curated. Video stops the scroll so use as often as possible. Particularly reels because its new so the algorithm will like you for using it!

PRESS LIST: A contact list of all the press you would like to be feature in. Build a relationship with them on social media and add them to your press email list.

TESTIMONIALS - Keep screenshots of all your customer testimonials. You might get some good feedback in a DM. Although you will probably have to ask for these, because people don’t always think to give them naturally. You could offer an incentive, like a discount code or voucher. Then add these testimonials to your website and promotional content.

MODULE 7

LESSON 1

HOMEWORK

PREPARING YOUR DIGITAL MARKETING TOOLKIT

Listen to the introduction video in lesson 1 (the transcript is in the download section) and then prepare your Marketing and PR “ingredients” below:

What are the core values that you share with your ideal customer.

_____________________________________________________________________

Your ELEVATOR PITCH/statement.

_____________________________________________________________________

Your why, your MISSION / higher purpose ? Why does your company exist.

_____________________________________________________________________

Your BRAND STORY (Someone should be able to understand what you are about just from your branding.

_____________________________________________________________________

SEO (Search Engine Optimisation) - What phrases are your customers searching? You can find research tools on google to carry out some Keyword research.

_____________________________________________________________________

What are your business GOALS and objectives?

_____________________________________________________________________

The top places you would like your brand to be seen.

_____________________________________________________________________

Your COMMUNICATION OBJECTIVES. How do you want your company portrayed in the media?

_____________________________________________________________________

Where do your want your company seen. What social media or print media you aim to target.

_____________________________________________________________________

Where does your ICA (Ideal Customer Avatar) hang out? Are they on social media? Are they on facebook, instagram, Pinterest, etc.

_____________________________________________________________________

What is your USP (unique selling point) that makes you different from your competitors?

_____________________________________________________________________

Start a list of topics your customers are interested in. You could actually start a Topic Journal to add topics whenever they come into your mind. These will be topics you can talk about on your social media posts etc.

_____________________________________________________________________

Prepare a folder in Dropbox or The Cloud titled “Marketing Kit” to upload the above responses and also the following (Lesson 1 video or transcript provides further information to help you create these):-

BIOGRAPHY

HEADSHOTS

PHOTOGRAPHY OF YOUR PRODUCTS

PRODUCT SHOTS ON PLAIN BACKGROUND

VIDEOS

PRESS LIST

TESTIMONIALS

MODULE 7

LESSON 2

CONTENT CREATION

CONTENT CREATION

Right, so now that you're clear on Your values, mission, brand story & elevator pitch, you’ve got SEO set up and your DIGITAL MARKETING TOOL KIT is complete you are now ready to plan a PR campaign!

Write down your MARKETING AND PR GOALS in your workbook. Once clear on these you are ready to Generate creative CAMPAIGNS and STRATEGIES to get your message out there.

Social media engagement is a really valuable part of your PR and Marketing toolkit. And it’s FREE so perfect to start a business. This is your highlight reel so you want to show the best of you and your brand.

Start off by focusing on a maximum of two to three platforms i.e. Facebook, & instagram or You Tube, Linked In and Pinterest (wherever your audience hang out) and then post relevant, regular content. Don't however believe that you need a huge instagram following to build a successful business. IG is just one tool in the whole marketing mix. And it might not even be where your audience are!

Build Relationships with the media, both print and on-line. Comment on and share their posts. Show them you are paying attention by saying how much you enjoyed their post about such and such. Be genuine and authentic and do this consistently NOT just when you want to promote your product.

Make yourself a social media CONTENT CALENDAR (You will find a link to a three month Content Calendar below). Planning in monthly or 90 day batches will give purpose, clarity and CONSISTENCY to your content. Especially if you have someone else do it for you, and it will ultimately save you time. It doesn't matter what strategy you use, it’s always important to be CONSISTENT, offer VALUE and be STRATEGIC.

CONTENT & MESSAGING

You need to create consistent content on a weekly basis to attract your tribe and you can’t just build your business on social media. You could also have a blog and a regular newsletter to your email list. There is a direct correlation between the quality of your content, the growth of your email list and your bank account. You can repurpose your content for example if you do a live every week on Facebook or instagram make sure to SAVE it then you can embed it on your blog or emails.

I recommend sitting down in silence, blocking out all distractions so that you can create authentic content. It’s best done in batches and if you plan that into your schedule, you’ll be committed to doing it consistently. And, Don’t forget to articulate the value of your products when creating your content.

Hands down the best way to attract an audience is through VIDEO. Anything that moves and has sound stops the scroll and helps the algorithm. So, here are a few tips for your videos.

have text / subtitles because lots of people scroll without sound. These can just be straight to the point snappy headlines, or full subtitles.
Videos can be as raw, natural and authentic or as polished and overproduced as you like depending on the purpose. They can also be as long or as short as you like (depending on the platform). But with reels and tik tok its actually better NOT to over produce. Reels and Tik Tok like quick instant raw real and authentic content.
With reels make sure you have native content that’s produced within instagram itself. Don’t use content from tik tok because instagram is not showing content with tik tok branding . And the Algorithm will not like it
All types of video will help with the know like and trust factor. Lack of the know, like & trust factor is one of biggest barriers to people buying.
Use all the hashtags. Try your favourites out . See what your competitors are using and try those out. You probably want hashtags with under 5000 followers. Perhaps 500 to 3000 might work best. If a hashtag has over 5000 followers it might not be so good because your post could get lost. Test different ones to get to know the best hashtags for you.
Marketing perspectives: make sure you are posting with a purpose. You need a strategy for all social media content including reels. Your strategy might be to attract new customers, build a relationship with customers or to directly sell.
Use eye-catching content that will stop the scroll.
Articulate the value of your products by highlighting the benefits of the product and your brand.

Always include a CTA (Call to Action). That could just be to comment in the DM’s or to sign up to your newsletter to be notified of your launch dates & special offers, to receive styling tips or updates about behind the scenes work or even your daily activities and so on. Or to go to your blog etc.
A simple video idea is just to add audio to an image in canva. If you don’t know canva have a look at “canva.com". Its an easy photo editing platform to create social media content and much more. And there’s a great free version.
You can share footage of work in progress, garments at various stages of manufacture, hints of your garments evolving, colours, sketches, fabrics and shapes to add excitement for your forthcoming launch.
Video your photoshoots to edit for behind the scenes video content.
Upload it to your website, push it out on your socials, and include in your emails.
Have fun editing your videos, speed them up, slow them down, add cheerful audio to make them as eye-catching as you can.

Use this link to get your CONTENT CALENDAR:

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1lm3I4CTegnwpbINURhcLFGG8sqAFAo2f37KxXmA6oi4/edit?usp=sharing

Once open go to “File” at the top right, then ”make a copy” so that you have your own copy to adapt.

Then go to the very Botton and right click on the title bar “3-Month Content Calendar (June 2021 - Aug 2021). Here you want to click on “duplicate”. To create another duplicate (or several) that you can then alter the dates to make more three month calendars.

MODULE 7

LESSON 3

CONTENT CALENDAR

CONTENT CALENDAR

To create your individual CONTENT CALENDAR you should block out about 2 hours in your schedule. It’s a good idea to set a timer to help you stay focused, on task and within a time limit.

So, how do you come up with ideas for your content. Here are some ideas:

Brain dump - don’t worry about grammar at this stage. You’ll do that later. just get creative and write down all your ideas. Come up with as many themes as possible. Then have another brain dump to come up with the actual topics. Once you have your topics schedule in time to batch these in chunks of perhaps six pieces of content a day.

What topics are your audience are interested. YOUR SHARED VALUES. What can you offer that will excite them?

Survey your audience. You can use a FB or IG Stories poll with a few Topics for them to choose what they want. If your audience is too small then you could look at what your competitors audience are saying in their comments to get to know what kind of things they would like to from you.

Use seasonal holidays or activities as themes for content. Time & Date Funny National holidays or Jazz Hostels Funny National Holidays both have a list of weird and fun national holidays.

Look at your old content that did really well, had lots of saved, comments or likes and put a different spin on that to repurpose.

Go to google and type in something that your audience would naturally type if they were looking for your product. Google will tell you the top searched or top clicked words and how many people searched. You can pick your topic ideas from here. Also look at the bottom where it shows “searches related to”.

Start a content notebook where you can jot down any daily stories about things that happened throughout your day to day life and from this list you can pull out stories to turn into content.

Try new ideas and TEST TEST TEST to see what is resonating with your audience. Keep an eye on the metrics in “Insights”and make more of what they are commenting on, liking or saving.

If it helps to come up with ideas you can work in rotation with four or five topics, For example:

1. Styling tips

2. A story about your daily activity drinking coffee, walking the dog, your cute cat (what would interest your audience)

3. A reel - fun and entertaining

4. Behind the scenes (work in progress or a photoshoot, a visit to your manufacturer, visiting a fabric trade show etc.

5. Educational - i.e. how you made the garment, a story about the fabrics etc.

Every fourth or fifth post could be a quote with the background in your brand colours to maintain a consistent vibe.

etc.

Use this link to get your CONTENT CALENDAR:

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1lm3I4CTegnwpbINURhcLFGG8sqAFAo2f37KxXmA6oi4/edit?usp=sharing

Once open go to “File” at the top right, then ”make a copy” so that you have your own copy to adapt.

MODULE 7

LESSON 4

PR ACTIVITIES

PR ACTIVITIES

To help with your PR work the following resources could be very helpful. These will all be in your workbook:

Search #journorequests on twitter
Sign up to Fashion Monitor and DIARY newsletters
Sign up for HARO
Set up Google Alerts

Running SOCIAL MEDIA GIVEAWAYS to customers and fans will definitely increase your engagement. Not only can it be a nice way of thanking your existing customers, it’s also a handy way of reaching potential new customers.

REFERRALS are a good way to grow your audience. The incentive of a discount code or voucher for your customers to refer you to their friends, share your posts and talk about the product they bought from you is very powerful.

Word of mouth is still a REALLY great way to get your company noticed.

Don’t forget to develop relationships with people in PRINT MEDIA. Get to know who books in garments for editorials and start by engaging with them and sharing THEIR work on social media. If you share their stuff enough hopefully they’ll eventually notice you. Let them know each time you have any events, launches or substantial updates (But please make sure you don't spam them with irrelevant stuff).

INFLUENCER marketing is a huge industry and can be an extremely effective marketing strategy.

So, HOW do you connect with an influencer to have them promote your product?

Again, it comes down to authenticity and having a strategy. Ask yourself how can you add value to their audience . Is your product aligned with their content. Develop a relationship with them first and then reach out.

Don't just message them without first taking an interest in THEM. In your introduction email make sure you SHOW that you've been been paying attention to THEIR posts and THEIR work. Don’t just make demands about what YOU want.

If you decide to gift them your product this does NOT guarantee sales or even that they’ll promote it. The gift is just part of your strategy. Say something like :

"I love your posts about __this or that__ and I see that you are interested in _this_.

I have some great _blankedyblancs_and I think that your audience would really enjoy my brand.

I would love to send you a gift".

blabedy bla

If your’e lucky they may promote it in their feed but at least they should remember you, and perhaps next time will promote your stuff.

Organic content, known as UGC (User generated content), from a blogger who is really genuinely excited about your product is THE best kind. But it's really difficult to get a post just from a gift.

So, you'll probably have to enter into a paid agreement. If you don't have a budget for this perhaps you could give them a commission for anything sold from their posts. (This is called Affiliate Marketing).

Don’t get excited by the more popular influencers because they charge astronomical rates.

And don't be impressed by huge follower numbers that might not even be real.

Instead, look for those with smaller followings (“micro-influencers”) that have high engagement rates. That's the sweetspot where you'll get the most engagement.

Target them and they might be willing to post something in return for a free product.

You might even have some influencers following your brand already? Even if they only have 1000 followers if they already like your stuff then who else will be a better advocate!

When you get into a relationship with a blogger be prepared to pay for several posts. Just one single post wo'nt give you any ROI (return on investment) and people usually need to see your content an average of 7 times before they buy

Firstly check the influencer is legitimate.

Look at their posts. Do they have an engaged audience? And do the comments relate to the posts?

So, now you have your consistent content in hand, you’ve been building relationships and its time to LAUNCH your new collection! Yayyyyy. How exciting!

When it comes to promoting your LAUNCH think of it like a movie trailer. Hollywood doesn’t wait until the movie is released to say – go watch it now! They promote the film for MONTHS before the release so you’re already excited and just dying to get a ticket on opening day. You can do the exact same thing. In fact, as I said earlier one of the biggest mistakes startups make is to wait until everything “is perfect” before gathering a following of prospects.

You don’t have to – and in fact shouldn’t – wait until you’re ready

there is an online launch calendar in module 7 Lessons 5A and 5B.

You will want to customise it. I would map it out using this as a starting point and if you know something needs adjusting, adjust it.

Everything else you could just use this plan for now as a starting point until you gain the knowledge from your launch. Share your journey here in the group.

For your first few launches, until you gain the insight as to how long things actually take I would leave as much time as possible. (maybe spread out your launch over a slightly longer timeframe than this schedule for a first launch).

Although basically you set a deadline and that's your window of time to get the job done. Sometimes we will just use as little or as short a time as allowed to achieve the same amount of work!

Bear in mind that complex products and large collections require a much longer time than a single product launch. This example was for a 6 piece collection with nothing too complex.

After this launch you will obviously achieve specific knowledge regarding dates, tasks etc and can then plan a more specific launch calendar for next time.

And, I would keep updating this plan with each new information you receive from every launch.

I've added the calendar example that I used in that training and you'll also find it in the download section of module 7 lessons 5A and 5B

#launch #launchrunway #launchcalendar #launchexample #launching #onlinelaunchcalendar

Launch plan ( This is in FLC module 1 but will touch on here in the PR & Marketing module

1. Decide on a date within 90 days. Since its your first time doing this you should allow plenty of time so lets say 90 days from beginning of February.(It depends on the size and complexity of your collection and the type of launch you are doing). Bear in mind that your launch content ramp-up will need to start four to six weeks ahead of the launch date.

2. Now get to work mapping out your launch on a calendar. I like to print calendar pages from ical and mount to a mount board so I have a large plan of the entire launch runway all in one view

3. Start mapping out the launch and writing all the dates on the calendar. Here is an example of a launch you might want to try. You can use this exactly as is for your first launch but this is just an example and will need to be altered to fit your brand, quantity of products, type of launch etc.

If we work to a 90 day launch plan. Let’s say your launch date is about 12 weeks or 90 days from beginning of February . Lets say you choose Thursday 28th April. Avoid Friday because that is traditionally when people go out .

start engaging with media now so when you do invite them to the launch they already have some connection to you.

Speak to manufacturers now to book them in for that one or two week period after cart close to produce all the orders. If you are doing made to order do you need to invest in some fabric in advance or are your materials always in stock and very easy to get at a minutes notice. Remember you need to allow time for delivery of materials which will eat into your manufacturing time.

Firstly decide what your launch event will be. For the sake of this launch example I will plan for a virtual online launch event with e-commerce where the shopping cart will opening during the event. Will you do it alone or will you collaborate with another designer? If so contact them now and decide on the format. For example you could invite your audience to the unveiling of your new collections with giveaways and prizes for those who attend live and an opening night discount. Get creative here. This virtual event could be a Facebook live so anyone that gets your notifications or that just happens to see it could also join. Do some practise sessions first to make sure you understand how to get on live and that you have a consistent good wifi connection.

Make sure your camera is set up securely on a tripod or somewhere stable with really good light. You can buy tripods and lighting kits on amazon for example led lights or soft box lights with a green screen backdrop are only £120 or single soft box lights around £45. Or even a ring light can work well. If you have your event during daylight you might get away without lights but bear in mind that daylight changes and you need the garments to be clearly viewed. How will you entertain your audience while describing your collection. Will you just run through the collection pointing out all the amazing benefits and the story of what inspired you and why you are doing this etc etc (be really clear on you mission statement, Value articulator statement, USP, Your Why….. and of course never just rattle these off as you have written them down. Just be really clear about them so that you naturally and conversationally can talk about you, your brand, why, mission, inspiration amazing benefits of your collection etc . Perhaps start preparing a variety of pitches and start practising with these and how you will present your collection by taking videos of yourself.

You might be entertaining them with competitions in between talking about your collection. Have some music etc. You could have a livestream of models lounging around wearing your garments. Decide on a theme for your event. Will you have a backdrop? If there are two of you you can switch from one to the other in a discussion about each others brands and collections. So plan how you will entertain your audience. You can have a live countdown to cart open with confetti. Then cart stays open for 1 week, 2 weeks, 3 weeks…

You decide your cart close date bearing in mind that if you are doing made to order you need enough time after cart close to produce all the garments in time to ship to the customers. So if you leave the cart open for too long it could mean more sales but it means a really long delivery date to your customer.

PLANNING YOUR CALENDAR

In this example I have opened cart on launch day 28th April. If we keep the cart open for 12 days so you can collect a few orders that means cart close will be on 10 May.

. Then perhaps 3 weeks to produce and 1 week to pack and ship. I would add a week for any problems . That gives you a 6 week delivery schedule to your customer. If your products are really low cost it might be good to make some inventory ahead of time so some items, at least, can get shipped out immediately.

If some garments are limited because there is limited fabric stock make that clear and explain why. If you manage to pull this off, heightening the excitement of your audience combined with some scarcity you should have no problem getting sales !!!

In this example I have allowed three weeks for manufacturing between 11th and 27th May. But this depends on your product, how and where it is being produced, if you can receive some of the production earlier then there can be an overlap as you start shipping out some of the garments. For example if you are producing 6 styles and the manufacture is producing all of style 1 in week 1 and all of style 2 in week 2, then styles 1 and 2 can get shipped out as soon as they have been produced and checked for quality.

Now that is a really oversimplified example. You would talk to your manufacturer and set a timescale before assessing how this would work.

As its your first time you will want to allow plenty of time for everything and your next launch can be done in a shorter time because then you know then how long things take.

If you are collaborating with another designer agree on a date that suits both of you.

You need to allow time for corrections (especially as its your first time you may not yet have a sample maker who understands what you want yet or you may not yet have mastered the art of communication…. So mistakes can happen due to poor communication.

That extra time will depend on the size of your collection. But let’s say you are just producing a 6 piece small capsule collection. I am going to give your one week to photograph and upload with descriptions and prices to your website and two weeks prior to that for corrections or any problems that cause delays. You want to concentrate on your launch the week before launch date and not on manufacturing nightmares. If you are stressed out with manufacturing nightmares you will not sell your brand or collections.

And as I said earlier when you know what you are doing this can be reduced. So your samples should be finalised by 8th April at the very latest…….and to be on the safe side we could say by no later than Friday 1st April. (Nb your suppliers might not meet your deadlines so always give them a deadline earlier than the actual deadline….so here give sample makers a deadline of25th or 28th March).

Pop that in your calendar.

For the photoshoot find a team that fits with your aesthetic and vibe: photographer, model Make-up Artist and Hair stylist and book a location. In London the Facebook group “London Fashion Creatives” can sometimes be a useful place to find your team.

Choose your location. For e-commerce or press shoot (which is our focus here) could be a photographers studio, a plain white wall in your own space if you have good lighting or even just a sheet over a garment rail. If you don’t have good lighting try to do it outside.

The location for a campaign shoot should suit the vibe of your garments i.e. a beach scene for beachwear, a relaxed home scene for loungewear, a picnic scene for relaxed summer garments etc.

Set a date that suits everyones schedule and mark on the calendar.

If you are starting out, selling on-line and all your promotion will be on-line then you can just keep it simple and do everything yourself on your phone as photoshoots can be very expensive. If, however you have the budget or want hard copy brochures etc then you will want a professional photographer and team. Sometimes if you find a photographer you like they will have make up artist and hair stylist contacts that they like to work with.

Check if you need permits.

It is not illegal to photograph in public. However you will more than likely need a permit to shoot in stately homes, parks, gardens, museums, churches, shopping malls, railway stations/airports and council or government buildings or graveyards. It's always best to check and arrange your permit in advance.

Then Create a moodboard for the theme of the shoot and discuss with the photographer showing any images of poses you like .

discuss with the makeup Artist and hair stylist, shoeing them any images of the type of makeup and hair you like.

These are photographs for your e-commerce shop so the lighting needs to be really good and poses very natural. The photos need to show really clear lifelike images of the textures and details of the materials and garments and a true representation of the colours.

Otherwise you will get lots of returns. For example if the colour tone shows as a light subdued shade online but the actual garment when they receive it is a bright hue or vice versa.

So, you’ve spoken to everyone involved in the shoot. Everyone can do Monday 11th April so that is marked on the calendar. (Remember.... prior to that you will need to arrange any transport if required to the shoot venue. and refreshments for the team as its a long day. It is nice to prepare some snacks and drinks for your team)

Now your launch event date is booked. Your photoshoot is booked with the shoot team in place.

We said garment samples have to be finalised by 1st April. If we are starting from beginning of February that is only 9 weeks away. Plan the schedule for your sampling i.e. designing 1 week, pattern making 2 weeks, toiling, fitting and amendments 2 weeks. Final samples 3 weeks, fittings and final alterations 1 week. That is your 9 weeks. So book in your sample team for the appropriate dates. Your job now is to project manage this ensuring everyone in the team meets their deadline.

Order all your materials and trims and make sure they arrive in plenty of time.

Plan your sales page and remember to include any testimonials from your customers.

PROMOTING YOUR LAUNCH

So now that the sampling process of your garments is underway you need to turn your attention to marketing and the launch runway.

At beginning of February we are 13 weeks out from the actual launch date so you don’t need to start ramping up your marketing activities , inviting everyone to the launch, until 4 to 6 weeks prior so that is 17th March. Between now and then you will be creating content for that launch ramp up to build massive excitement. Encourage your audience to share your content . You can Provide incentives such as “ Share on your stories tagging a friend to receive a discount” or share with 20 friends for £20 off or 30 friends for £30 off.

Here you can start working on the graphics and messaging of your actual invite. Make sure you get them to opt-in to your email list to receive reminders about the VIP launch event or to be entered in competitions , receive discount vouchers etc. At every opportunity you want to get them to opt into your email list.

Between now and then you want to build excitement by providing your audience with consistent content about work in progress; Hints of what is evolving; Tell them what you are planning. Get them really excited to follow your progress , attend your event and ultimately become a customer.

Contact the media (print and online), the bloggers and influencers to invite them to the launch or to write about it. What will make your event and collection different to catch their attention and make them want to write about it? What will their audience want?

CONTENT & MESSAGING

You need to create consistent content on a weekly basis to attract your tribe and you can’t just build your business on social media. You could also have a newsletter to your email list giving them regular news that will interest them, updates on new products and the progress of your business. You can repurpose your content for example you can trim longer videos to a short snappy reels.

Hands down the best way to attract an audience is through VIDEO. Anything that moves and has sound stops the scroll helps the algorithm. So, here are a few tips for your videos.

Use text / subtitles because lots of people scroll without sound. These can just be straight to the point snappy headlines, or full subtitles.
Videos can be as raw, natural and authentic or as polished and overproduced as you like depending on the purpose. They can also be as long or as short as you like (depending on the platform). But with reels and tik tok its actually better NOT to over produce. Reels and Tik Tok like quick instant raw real and authentic content.
With reels make sure you have native content that’s produced within instagram itself. Don’t use content from tik tok without removing the watermark because instagram is not showing content with tik tok branding . And the Algorithm will not like it
All types of video will help with the know like and trust factor. and it is Lack of the know, like & trust factor that is one of biggest barriers to people buying
Use all the hashtags. Try your favourites out . See what your competitors are using and try those out. You probably want hashtags with under 5000 followers. Perhaps 500 to 3000 might work best. If a hashtag has over 5000 followers it might not be so good because your post could get lost. Test different ones to get to know the best hashtags for you.
Make sure you are posting with a purpose. You need a strategy for all social media content including reels. Your strategy for this launch is initially to attract and build relationships with potential new customers and then later during the launch date your strategy starts to change to directly sell.
Use eye-catching content that will stop the scroll.
And Articulate the value of your products by highlighting the benefits of the product and your brand.
Always include a CTA (Call to Action). That could just be to comment in the DM’s or to sign up to your newsletter to be notified of your launch dates & special offers, to receive styling tips or updates about behind the scenes work or even your daily activities and so on. Or to go to your blog etc.
A simple video idea is just to add audio to an image in canva. If you don’t know canva have a look at “canva.com". Its an easy photo editing platform to create social media content and much more. And there’s a great free version.
You can share footage of work in progress, garments at various stages of manufacture, hints of your garments evolving, colours, sketches, fabrics and shapes to add excitement for your forthcoming launch.
Video your photoshoots to edit for behind the scenes video content.
Upload it to your website, push it out on your socials, and include in your emails.
Have fun editing your videos, speed them up, slow them down, add cheerful audio to make them as eye-catching as you can.

PR ACTIVITIES

To help with your PR work there are a few resources in the workbook of module 7 lesson 5 so have a look there:

Running SOCIAL MEDIA GIVEAWAYS to customers and your audience will definitely increase your engagement. Not only can it be a nice way of thanking your existing customers, it’s also a handy way of reaching potential new customers.

I have already mentioned this but REFERRALS are a good way to grow your audience. The incentive of a discount code or voucher for your customers to refer you to their friends, share your posts and talk about the product they bought from you is very powerful.

Word of mouth is still a REALLY great way to get your company noticed.

As I said don’t forget to develop relationships with people in PRINT MEDIA. Get to know who books in garments for editorials and start by engaging with them and sharing THEIR work on social media. If you share their stuff enough hopefully they’ll eventually notice you. Let them know about your launch event.

INFLUENCER marketing is a huge industry and can be an extremely effective marketing strategy.

So, HOW do you connect with an influencer to have them promote your product?

If you decide to gift them your product this does NOT guarantee sales or even that they’ll promote it. The gift is just part of your strategy. Say something like :

"I love your posts about __this or that__ and I see that you are interested in _this_.

I have some great _blankedyblancs_and I think that your audience would really enjoy my brand.

I would love to send you a gift".

blabedy bla

If your’e lucky they may promote it in their feed but at least they should remember you, and perhaps next time will promote your stuff.

Organic content, known as UGC (User generated content), from a blogger who is really genuinely excited about your product is THE best kind. But it's really difficult to get a post just from a gift.

Don’t get excited by the more popular influencers because they charge astronomical rates.

And don't be impressed by huge follower numbers that might not even be real.

Instead, look for those with smaller followings (“micro-influencers”) that have high engagement rates. That's the sweetspot where you'll get the most engagement.

Target them and they might be willing to post something in return for a free product.

You might even have some influencers following your brand already? Even if they only have 1000 followers if they already like your stuff then who else will be a better advocate!

When you get into a relationship with a blogger be prepared to pay for several posts. Just one single post won’t give you any ROI (return on investment) and people usually need to see your content several times before they buy

Firstly check the influencer is legitimate.

Look at their posts. Do they have an engaged audience? And do the comments relate to the posts?

You could do some paid ads either in print format or the best performing ads right now are Facebook ads. You really don’t want to just use the boost function. Invest in some real ads…. But if you really dont know what you are doing then a boost ad could be useful.

Facebook and instagram ads are really only effective if you already have an organic audience so work hard at building that first.

Mailchimp has a beginners guide to Ads: https://mailchimp.com/resources/how-to-build-your-email-list/ but if you’re serious about using ads you might want to employ an ads specialist as it can get fairly complex.

If you do ads I would put those up 7 to 10 days ahead of the launch date.

As you get closer to the launch Send reminders to everyone a week before, two days before 1 day before , 1 hour before and 15 minutes before . You can also use a countdown timer.

CONTENT CALENDAR

Create all your content in advance and using a content calendar detailing what content you will be putting out each day.

This content should really include some video. Plan some reels and lives. Just set up your camera and video yourself working all day then edit it down to some speeded up fun little clips to trending music.

To create your CONTENT CALENDAR block out about 2 hours in your schedule.

So, how do you come up with ideas for your content. Here are some ideas:

Brain dump - don’t worry about grammar at this stage. You’ll do that later. just get creative and write down all your ideas. Come up with as many themes as possible. Then have another brain dump to come up with the actual topics. Once you have your topics schedule in time to batch these in chunks of perhaps six pieces of content a day.

What topics are your audience interested in. YOUR SHARED VALUES. What can you offer that will excite them?

Survey your audience. You can use a FB or IG Stories poll with a few Topics for them to choose what they want.

Use seasonal holidays or activities as themes for content. The workbook in module 7 has some links to help you with this.

Look at your old content that did really well, had lots of saved, comments or likes and put a different spin on that to repurpose.

Go to google and type in something that your audience would naturally type if they were looking for your product. Google will tell you the top searched or top clicked words and how many people searched. You can pick your topic ideas from here.

Start a content notebook where you can jot down any daily stories about things that happened throughout your day to day life and from this list you can pull out stories to turn into content.
Try new ideas and TEST TEST TEST to see what is resonating with your audience. Keep an eye on the metrics and make more of what they are commenting on, liking or saving.

If it helps to come up with ideas you can work in rotation with four or five topics, For example

1. Styling tips

2. A story about your daily activity drinking coffee, walking the dog, your cute cat (what would interest your audience)

3. A fun and entertaining reel

4. Behind the scenes (work in progress or a photoshoot). It could be a visit to your manufacturer or visiting a fabric trade show.

5. Educational - i.e. how you made the garment, a story about the fabrics etc.

Some people find that consistent rotation really helpful.

Always be keeping an eye on your schedule so you dont miss any important deadlines.

PHOTOSHOOT

So garments are finalised, its all coming together and its almost photoshoot day. Remind the team so you dont have any last minute cancellations. Plan transport. Check venue etc. buy some refreshments for team.

Images for E-commerce or for press need good lighting a plain background and the focus is on the products, NOT the styling.

Whereas A campaign shoot is a very stylised shoot around the theme of your collection.

Here we are focusing on photos for your e-commerce site and for press.

If you’re organised you could do them both on the same day saving time and money.

It helps to create a moodboard to show your photographer, hairdresser and make-up artist what you are looking for. The moodboard for your stylised campaign shoot will be different to the moodboard for an e-commerce or press shoot. The campaign moodboard will be all about your theme, colours, imagery whereas the e-commerce or press shoot will be more technical showing the lighting you want and the types of poses you would like from the models. Unlike the campaign shoot the poses here are fairly simple.

Talk to the photographer about how you would like your photos to look across all platforms. Tell him what formats you need i.e. landscape for your website and portrait for IG stories.

If you are starting out and don’t have a budget for a model then you can look for a model thats just starting out (who will work for a low rate or perhaps even just to get good photos) on Instagram or in Facebook groups such as London Fashion Creatives, you can wear them yourself or ask a friend. Often photographers will know good models they like to work with so ask your photographer . They might even have good relationships with models who are starting out and will do it for free as they like the images that photographer produces for them. Clothing is always best shown on a person however with some garments you can even just suspend them on hangers in a cool way.

Accessories could be propped on a piece of nature, on an object in your home etc. Get creative . You just need really good lighting.

Video record the shoot to add to your marketing kit, so that you can edit little bits out for your behind the scenes content.

LAUNCH DAY

On the day of the launch shift off the external world of problems. You need to be in a happy upbeat vibe. Get ready well in advance so you are not joining the event stressed out and distracted.

It might help to have someone with you to keep it relaxed fun and engaging.

On cart open day you could have a discount until the end of that day.

Then the day after the event you could go live on IG showing your excitement at all the orders placed and of course to tell them that the products are now available to the public until X date when cart closes and no more orders will be taken because you need to get them produced and shipped to all the lovely customers who are waiting for them.

Always give a reason why you are doing something . i.e. tell them why cart is closing, why no more orders will be taken beyond a certain date because if you dont then they will form their own assumption and it might not be in your favour.

For example here are three ways to know if your product will sell:

RESEARCH: Research what your customers (or potential customers) are buying and how much they pay. Research in their feeds, are they sharing their purchases? Ask them - Do a live or post a fun gif asking what their recent favourite purchase was.
ASK: Ask your customers for feedback - Show them hints of your garments evolving (in a live or images) and see what interest you get. A live video is great for this where you can really talk through the design - why you created it, the inspiration behind it, the fabric you used, highlight the details etc and ask them to pop a heart in the DM’s if they like love it. etc. etc. Be original and authentic on lives and you will soon have LOADS of raving fans!!
TEST: Start with just a few items and test by selling to your audience on social media or email list.

Now we’re going to delve deeper into the big ocean of Marketing and PR !!

Firstly let’s talk about what marketing is:

Creating an advertising campaign for your new collection & generating a buzz… OR…
Buying advertising slots FOR that campaign.
Creating supporting materials, like brochures and website LANDING pages.
Carrying out RESEARCH to help drive the direction of your campaigns..OR…
Drafting a weekly newsletter for your clients.

How you promote yourself when posting on social media or speaking to your customers.
Building relationships with the media.
How you execute your product launch.
What strategies you use to drive engagement.
Your content and messaging. (More about that later)
It could be booking exhibition space.
Writing a press release.
Pitching stories about upcoming events…

Your core VALUES, beliefs and principles. How you talk about yourself and what you do. Your customers values and your SHARED VALUES.

Your ELEVATOR PITCH/statement? This should be really concise and take no more than about 30 seconds to say. It should be written in simple language so that even a 10 year old would under-stand what you do.

Your why, your MISSION / higher purpose ? Why does your company exist. A higher purpose or mission helps build connection with your audience , for example if you design childrenswear your mission might be to help create a better future for children.

Your BRAND STORY (Someone should be able to understand what you are about just from your branding. In fact if your content could successfully represent another designer it's not good enough. It must be unique so that when people see your website, garments, social media, newsletters, videos, blogs, vlogs or whatever they immediately identify it with you.

SEO (Search Engine Optimisation) should be set up on your website. What phrases are your customers searching? You can find research tools on google to carry out some Keyword research. Having a BLOG on your website can really help with this. Come up with a strategy to create and share unique, authentic & relevant content. Blogs are great way to help with SEO because they keep your website fresh & current and keeps people on there for longer. There will be a whole lesson on SEO later.

Your business GOALS and objectives?

The top places you would like your brand to be seen.

Your COMMUNICATION OBJECTIVES. How do you want your company portrayed in the media?

The social media or print media you aim to target.

Your target audience/ IDEAL CUSTOMER AVATAR (ICA)

Where they hang out? Are they on social media? Are they on facebook, instagram, Pinterest, etc.

Your USP (unique selling point) that makes you different from your competitors?

What’s genuine and unique about your brand that will make somebody follow you and eventually become a customer?

BIOGRAPHY: No more than about 150 words. It is useful to have this pre-prepared in your marketing kit so that you can quickly access it and just change to suit different platforms /purposes as required.

HEADSHOTS: A variety of quality images in both portrait and landscape formats is useful to have in your kit for quick access to add to social media posts or provide to press etc.

CREATIVE PHOTOGRAPHY: For each new launch you will want to do a photoshoot. If you are just starting out there’s no need to hire an expensive photographer. Just get creative with your phone

PRODUCT SHOTS: These are photographs of your products to send to the press or to upload to your e-commerce site. These should just be on a plain transparent or white background. Don't send high res images until requested and, in fact it's probably better to add download links instead. If you are just starting out and doing the photoshoots yourself you can drape a white sheet over a clothes rail to achieve a plain background, or even just attach a large piece of paper to a wall or even a tree etc!! If you have a plain white wall in your home that gets good daylight you can use that. At some point you will want to invest in some good lighting.

VIDEOS of work in progress, behind the scenes, your photoshoot etc. Keep behind the scenes raw footage handy in your digital marketing toolkit ready to be edited for your content. Just use the camera on your phone. You can also use make some entertaining tik tok videos or IG reels to get eyeballs on your brand. You don’t have to create Hollywoodesque movies. For IG reels or tik tok people actually DON’T want it to be polished & over curated. Video stops the scroll so use as often as possible. Particularly reels because its new so the algorithm will like you for using it!

PRESS LIST: A contact list of all the press you would like to be feature in. Build a relationship with them on social media and add them to your press email list.

TESTIMONIALS - Keep screenshots of all your customer testimonials. You might get some good feedback in a DM. Although you will probably have to ask for these, because people don’t always think to give them naturally. You could offer an incentive, like a discount code or voucher. Then add these testimonials to your website and promotional content.

Write down your MARKETING AND PR GOALS in your workbook. Once clear on these you are ready to Generate creative CAMPAIGNS and STRATEGIES to get your message out there.

Make yourself a social media CONTENT CALENDAR (there’s a link in your workbook to a google doc three month content calendar) . Planning in monthly or 90 day batches will give purpose, clarity and CONSISTENCY to your content. Especially if you have someone else do it for you, and it will ultimately save you time. It doesn't matter what strategy you use, it’s always important to be CONSISTENT, offer VALUE and be STRATEGIC.

CONTENT & MESSAGING

Hands down the best way to attract an audience is through VIDEO. Anything that moves and has sound stops the scroll and helps the algorithm. So, here are a few tips for your videos.

have text / subtitles because lots of people scroll without sound. These can just be straight to the point snappy headlines, or full subtitles.
Videos can be as raw, natural and authentic or as polished and overproduced as you like depending on the purpose. They can also be as long or as short as you like (depending on the platform). But with reels and tik tok its actually better NOT to over produce. Reels and Tik Tok like quick instant raw real and authentic content.
With reels make sure you have native content that’s produced within instagram itself. Don’t use content from tik tok because instagram is not showing content with tik tok branding . And the Algorithm will not like it
All types of video will help with the know like and trust factor. Lack of the know, like & trust factor is one of biggest barriers to people buying.
Use all the hashtags. Try your favourites out . See what your competitors are using and try those out. You probably want hashtags with under 5000 followers. Perhaps 500 to 3000 might work best. If a hashtag has over 5000 followers it might not be so good because your post could get lost. Test different ones to get to know the best hashtags for you.
Marketing perspectives: make sure you are posting with a purpose. You need a strategy for all social media content including reels. Your strategy might be to attract new customers, build a relationship with customers or to directly sell.
Use eye-catching content that will stop the scroll.
Articulate the value of your products by highlighting the benefits of the product and your brand.
Always include a CTA (Call to Action). That could just be to comment in the DM’s or to sign up to your newsletter to be notified of your launch dates & special offers, to receive styling tips or updates about behind the scenes work or even your daily activities and so on. Or to go to your blog etc.
A simple video idea is just to add audio to an image in canva. If you don’t know canva have a look at “canva.com". Its an easy photo editing platform to create social media content and much more. And there’s a great free version.
You can share footage of work in progress, garments at various stages of manufacture, hints of your garments evolving, colours, sketches, fabrics and shapes to add excitement for your forthcoming launch.
Video your photoshoots to edit for behind the scenes video content.
Upload it to your website, push it out on your socials, and include in your emails.
Have fun editing your videos, speed them up, slow them down, add cheerful audio to make them as eye-catching as you can.

For workbook only Use this link to get your CONTENT CALENDAR:

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1lm3I4CTegnwpbINURhcLFGG8sqAFAo2f37KxXmA6oi4/edit?usp=sharing

Once open go to “File” at the top right, then ”make a copy” so that you have your own copy to adapt.

To create your individual CONTENT CALENDAR you should block out about 2 hours in your schedule. It’s a good idea to set a timer to help you stay focused, on task and within a time limit.

So, how do you come up with ideas for your content. Here are some ideas:

Brain dump - don’t worry about grammar at this stage. You’ll do that later. just get creative and write down all your ideas. Come up with as many themes as possible. Then have another brain dump to come up with the actual topics. Once you have your topics schedule in time to batch these in chunks of perhaps six pieces of content a day.

What topics are your audience are interested. YOUR SHARED VALUES. What can you offer that will excite them?

Survey your audience. You can use a FB or IG Stories poll with a few Topics for them to choose what they want. If your audience is too small then you could look at what your competitors audience are saying in their comments to get to know what kind of things they would like to from you.

Use seasonal holidays or activities as themes for content. Time & Date Funny National holidays or Jazz Hostels Funny National Holidays both have a list of weird and fun national holidays. You’ll find these links in your workbook.

Look at your old content that did really well, had lots of saved, comments or likes and put a different spin on that to repurpose.

Go to google and type in something that your audience would naturally type if they were looking for your product. Google will tell you the top searched or top clicked words and how many people searched. You can pick your topic ideas from here. Also look at the bottom where it shows “searches related to”.

Start a content notebook where you can jot down any daily stories about things that happened throughout your day to day life and from this list you can pull out stories to turn into content.
Try new ideas and TEST TEST TEST to see what is resonating with your audience. Keep an eye on the metrics in “Insights”and make more of what they are commenting on, liking or saving.

If it helps to come up with ideas you can work in rotation with four or five topics, For example

1. Styling tips

2. A story about your daily activity drinking coffee, walking the dog, your cute cat (what would interest your audience)

3. A reel - fun and entertaining

4. Behind the scenes (work in progress or a photoshoot, a visit to your manufacturer, visiting a fabric trade show etc.

5. Educational - i.e. how you made the garment, a story about the fabrics etc.

Every fourth or fifth post could be a quote with the background in your brand colours to maintain a consistent vibe.

etc.

PR ACTIVITIES

To help with your PR work the following resources could be very helpful. These will all be in your workbook:

Search #journorequests on twitter

Set up Google Alerts

Word of mouth is still a REALLY great way to get your company noticed.

INFLUENCER marketing is a huge industry and can be an extremely effective marketing strategy.

So, HOW do you connect with an influencer to have them promote your product?

If you decide to gift them your product this does NOT guarantee sales or even that they’ll promote it. The gift is just part of your strategy. Say something like :

"I love your posts about __this or that__ and I see that you are interested in _this_.

I have some great _blankedyblancs_and I think that your audience would really enjoy my brand.

I would love to send you a gift".

blabedy bla

If your’e lucky they may promote it in their feed but at least they should remember you, and perhaps next time will promote your stuff.

Organic content, known as UGC (User generated content), from a blogger who is really genuinely excited about your product is THE best kind. But it's really difficult to get a post just from a gift.

Don’t get excited by the more popular influencers because they charge astronomical rates.

And don't be impressed by huge follower numbers that might not even be real.

Instead, look for those with smaller followings (“micro-influencers”) that have high engagement rates. That's the sweetspot where you'll get the most engagement.

Target them and they might be willing to post something in return for a free product.

You might even have some influencers following your brand already? Even if they only have 1000 followers if they already like your stuff then who else will be a better advocate!

Firstly check the influencer is legitimate.

Look at their posts. Do they have an engaged audience? And do the comments relate to the posts?

So, now you have your consistent content in hand, you’ve been building relationships and its time to LAUNCH your new collection! Yayyyyy. How exciting!

You don’t have to – and in fact shouldn’t – wait until you’re ready !!

THE LAUNCH RUNWAY

This is only to launch your collection for sale on-line. I will have a different launch schedule for a trade event or catwalk show later.

So, You’ll need at least four to six weeks ahead for your launch runway for a CONTENT RAMP-UP!

Decide on the date that you will launch your new collection to the world and work backwards.

What will your launch be?

A launch of your e-commerce store with a live IG showing you on your laptop counting down to the cart opening
An event in a local space. You could collaborate with i.e. a jewellery designer to share costs and audiences.
A zoom event with your audience i.e. quiz night with vouchers as prizes.
A fun IG Live showing the new garments and talking through all the value enhancing details. Make it a party atmosphere with their favourite tipple. Talk about your favourite tipple and even have one to get the party atmosphere going but do not drink it as you want full mental clarity. Open your sales cart at the end of the event and you could even have a live countdown to cart opening. If some garments are limited because there is limited fabric stock make that clear and explain why. If you manage to pull this off, heightening the excitement of your audience combined with some scarcity you should have no problem getting sales !!!
A livestream of models wearing your new garments - Whats the theme? the location? Make your own fun backdrop etc.

Also plan some pre-launch activities to build excitement:

Giveaways
Competitions
Encourage your audience to share your content with incentives
Lives - You could do weekly lives on the run-up to launch day.

These are just a few ideas to get you started. Once you have decide what your LAUNCH will be, in Your CONTENT CALENDAR plan at least 30 days of content leading up to your LAUNCH. This content will relate specifically to your products to build excitement.

Four to Six weeks ahead of your launch you could follow this checklist:

Contact the print media, bloggers etc that you have been building relationships with. Let them know what you are doing and invite them to your launch.

Send traditional postcards to the print media. You can use a cute illustration or collage for your card. Or, as soon as one garment is ready you can take a stylised photo.

Contact everyone in your email list (Module 2 had some links to software to create your list)

Start implementing your 30 day pre-LAUNCH RAMP-UP CONTENT CALENDAR

Talk about it in your blog or podcast.

Use Instagram & Facebook Ads. Its a good idea and more cost effective to grow your audience organically first before starting ads because you can then use that list to create a “lookalike audience” that will target similar people. Mailchimp has a beginners guide to Ads: https://mailchimp.com/resources/how-to-build-your-email-list/ but if you’re serious about using ads you might want to employ an ads specialist as it can get fairly complex.

You will need to post reminders to all your socials and also the print media, bloggers etc perhaps two weeks before, two days before, 1 day and 1 hour before the launch, using your countdown timer.

During the event engage as much as possible with your audience. Its not necessary but if it helps, get your sales director, PR director, assistant if you have one, or a friend to help support you with the event. It’s important this is fun, engaging and exciting.

The day after your event go live on IG showing your excitement at all the orders you placed on opening night / day, and of course the products that are now available to the public.

PHOTOSHOOTS

Great photographs are essential to selling your garments on and off line. There are two types of photoshoots:

E-commerce or for press - This needs good lighting a plain white background and the focus is on the products, NOT the styling.

Campaign shoot - This is a very stylised shoot around the theme of your collection.

If you’re organised you could do them both on the same day saving time and money.

To start you need to develop a narrative and find your team that fits with your aesthetic and vibe: photographer, model Make-up Artist and Hair stylist and book a location. In London the Facebook group “London Fashion Creatives” can sometimes be a useful place to find your team. If you are starting out, selling on-line and all your promotion will be on-line then you can just keep it simple and do everything yourself on your phone as photoshoots can be very expensive. If, however you have the budget or want hard copy brochures etc then you will want a professional photographer and team. Sometimes if you find a photographer you like they will have a make up artist and hair stylist contacts that they like to work with.

If you have sponsorship links with a hair or make-up company sometimes they will provide their services for free. I talk about sponsors in another module.

Choose your location. For an e-commerce or press shoot could be a photographers studio, a plain white wall in your own space if you have good lighting or even just a sheet over a garment rail. If you don’t have good lighting try to do it outside.

The location for a campaign shoot should suit the vibe of your garments i.e. a beach scene for beachwear, a relaxed home scene for loungewear, a picnic scene for relaxed summer garments etc.

Check if you need permits. Most parks will require you to have a permit.

When you choose your photographer you will want someone who can relate to your vision and portray the vibe you want. Before booking you will want to see their portfolio and see if they have any work with a similar vibe to what you want. They need to be aesthetically in alignment with you but also have technical capabilities to use the right lighting, filters, lens etc. Talk to the photographer about how you would like your photos to look across all platforms. Tell him what formats you need i.e. landscape for your website and portrait for IG stories.

It’s important to choose a model or models who not only has the right “look” to suit your narrative and be the face of your brand, but that also looks good in your garments. You’ll have a hard time trying to sell ill fitting garments. For a campaign shoot can they move in the way you want? If you have the budget the easiest way is to use a model agency. Look through the model cards and choose a few you would like to see in a casting. When they arrive for the casting check:

That they have the right Personality for your brand
The right Aesthetic
The right Body shape
That your clothes fit them well. This is extremely important as no-one will by ill fitting garments.
That they can move in the way required for your narrative.

If you are starting out and don’t have a budget for a model then you can look on Instagram or in Facebook groups such as London Fashion Creatives, you can wear them yourself or ask a friend. Clothing is always best shown on a person however with some garments you can even just suspend them on hangers in a cool way.

Accessories could be propped on a piece of nature, on an object in your home etc. Get creative . You just need really good lighting.

Choose a date that suits everyone and on the day be sure to provide plenty of subsistence as a photoshoot can be a long tiring day!

Video record the shoot to add to your marketing kit, so that you can edit little bits out for your behind the scenes content.

you learned the importance of building your audience BEFORE you finish your collection and how to start building a community of like-minded people based around their LIFESTYLE and not just your specific products.

And if you remember, you identified your shared values….values that both you and your ideal customer have. You should be building most of your content around these shared values because this is what will draw them towards you, get them to rally behind you, follow you become a fan and eventually buy.

So….Module 7 is all about Marketing and PR. You cant market without a little PR and you cant do PR without a little marketing. Marketing and PR always did sit very closely together but the difference has blurred so much now because of social media marketing which actually sits right in the middle of both.

Marketing is about promoting and selling your products, supporting the sales team and handling advertising. While PR is about everything you do in the public eye that will re-inforce a positive consciousness of your brand. Is not an advert or promotion. Its a more farsighted strategy of hyping your brand at every opportunity.

So, examples of marketing could be:

Creating an advertising campaign,
generating a buzz
Creating brochures
Carrying out RESEARCH or
Drafting a weekly newsletter for clients.

Examples of pR could be:

How you promote yourself when posting on social media or speaking to your customers.
Building relationships with the media.
What strategies you use to drive engagement or to promote a product launch
Your content and messaging.
Writing a press release.
Pitching stories about upcoming events

But the overap is huge so its best not to worry about what you call it, just get on with doing hot!!!

Before you start you’ll need :

To understand the core values that you share with your ideal customers.
Your ELEVATOR PITCH/statement
Your why, your MISSION / higher purpose ? Why does your company exist.
Your BRAND STORY (Someone should be able to understand what you are about just from your branding.
SEO (Search Engine Optimisation) should be set up on your website. What phrases are your customers searching? You can find research tools on google to carry out some Keyword research.
Your business GOALS?
The top places you would like your brand to be seen.
Your COMMUNICATION OBJECTIVES. How do you want your company portrayed in the media?
The social media or print media you aim to target.
Your target audience/ IDEAL CUSTOMER AVATAR (ICA)
Where they hang out? Are they on social media? Are they on facebook, instagram, Pinterest, etc.
Your USP (unique selling point) that makes you different from your competitors? What’s genuine and unique about your brand that will make somebody follow you and eventually become a customer?
So that’s your homework for next week. Look at module 7 lesson 1 and prepare all these ingredients. I’ve added a workbook for you to fill in.

Once you have these basic ingredients you’re ready to create a DIGITAL MARKETING TOOLKIT Open a folder in Dropbox or The Cloud and give it the title “marketing kit” (If you have raw footage it might get too big to store on your computers hard drive).. This is where you can store all these marketing and pR ingredients for quick easy access.

YOUR DIGITAL MARKETING TOOLKIT CHECKLIST:

BIOGRAPHY: No more than about 150 words. It is useful to have this pre-prepared in your marketing kit and just change to suit different platforms.

HEADSHOTS: A variety of quality images in both portrait and landscape formats to add to social media posts.

CREATIVE PHOTOGRAPHY: For each new launch you will want to do a photoshoot. there’s no need to hire an expensive photographer. Just use your phone to get started.

PRODUCT SHOTS: These are photographs of your products to send to the press or for your website and they need to be on a plain transparent or white background. At some point you will want to invest in some good lighting and eventually hire a photographer but to start If you are doing the photoshoots yourself you can just drape a white sheet over a clothes rail, or attach a large piece of paper to a wall or even a tree if you want to use daylight !! Or If you have a plain white wall in your home that gets good daylight you can use that.

VIDEOS Keep behind the scenes raw footage of work in progress handy in your digital marketing toolkit ready to be edited for your content. This could be behind the scenes footage of photoshoots, fitting sessions, selecting fabrics, sketching, selecting colours, inspiration etc.. You can Just use the camera on your phone.

PRESS LIST: A contact list of all the press you would like to be feature in. Build a relationship with them on social media and add them to your press email list.

TESTIMONIALS - Keep screenshots of all your customer testimonials and add these to your website and promotional content.

Nb Jane add to workbook in portal:

Start list of topics your customers are interested in

So, examples of marketing could be:

Creating an advertising campaign,
generating a buzz
Creating brochures
Carrying out RESEARCH or
Drafting a weekly newsletter for clients.

Examples of pR could be:

How you promote yourself when posting on social media or speaking to your customers.
Building relationships with the media.
What strategies you use to drive engagement or to promote a product launch
Your content and messaging.
Writing a press release.
Pitching stories about upcoming events

But the overap is huge so its best not to worry about what you call it, just get on with doing hot!!!

Before you start you’ll need :

To understand the core values that you share with your ideal customers.
Your ELEVATOR PITCH/statement
Your why, your MISSION / higher purpose ? Why does your company exist.
Your BRAND STORY (Someone should be able to understand what you are about just from your branding.
SEO (Search Engine Optimisation) should be set up on your website. What phrases are your customers searching? You can find research tools on google to carry out some Keyword research.
Your business GOALS?
The top places you would like your brand to be seen.
Your COMMUNICATION OBJECTIVES. How do you want your company portrayed in the media?
The social media or print media you aim to target.
Your target audience/ IDEAL CUSTOMER AVATAR (ICA)
Where they hang out? Are they on social media? Are they on facebook, instagram, Pinterest, etc.
Your USP (unique selling point) that makes you different from your competitors? What’s genuine and unique about your brand that will make somebody follow you and eventually become a customer?
So that’s your homework for next week. Look at module 7 lesson 1 and prepare all these ingredients. I’ve added a workbook for you to fill in.

YOUR DIGITAL MARKETING TOOLKIT CHECKLIST:

BIOGRAPHY: No more than about 150 words. It is useful to have this pre-prepared in your marketing kit and just change to suit different platforms.

HEADSHOTS: A variety of quality images in both portrait and landscape formats to add to social media posts.

CREATIVE PHOTOGRAPHY: For each new launch you will want to do a photoshoot. there’s no need to hire an expensive photographer. Just use your phone to get started.

PRODUCT SHOTS: These are photographs of your products to send to the press or for your website and they need to be on a plain transparent or white background. At some point you will want to invest in some good lighting and eventually hire a photographer but to start If you are doing the photoshoots yourself you can just drape a white sheet over a clothes rail, or attach a large piece of paper to a wall or even a tree if you want to use daylight !! Or If you have a plain white wall in your home that gets good daylight you can use that.

VIDEOS Keep behind the scenes raw footage of work in progress handy in your digital marketing toolkit ready to be edited for your content. This could be behind the scenes footage of photoshoots, fitting sessions, selecting fabrics, sketching, selecting colours, inspiration etc.. You can Just use the camera on your phone.

PRESS LIST: A contact list of all the press you would like to be feature in. Build a relationship with them on social media and add them to your press email list.

TESTIMONIALS - Keep screenshots of all your customer testimonials and add these to your website and promotional content.

Nb Jane add to workbook in portal:

Start list of topics your customers are interested in

MODULE 7

LESSON 5

THE LAUNCH RUNWAY

THE LAUNCH RUNWAY

This is only to launch your collection for sale on-line. I will have a different launch schedule for a trade event or catwalk show later.

So, You’ll need at least four to six weeks ahead for your launch runway for a CONTENT RAMP-UP!

Decide on the date that you will launch your new collection to the world and work backwards.

What will your launch be?

A launch of your e-commerce store with a live IG showing you on your laptop counting down to the cart opening
An event in a local space. You could collaborate with i.e. a jewellery designer to share costs and audiences.
A zoom event with your audience i.e. quiz night with vouchers as prizes.
A fun IG Live showing the new garments and talking through all the value enhancing details. Make it a party atmosphere with their favourite tipple. Talk about your favourite tipple and even have one to get the party atmosphere going but do not drink it as you want full mental clarity. Open your sales cart at the end of the event and you could even have a live countdown to cart opening. If some garments are limited because there is limited fabric stock make that clear and explain why. If you manage to pull this off, heightening the excitement of your audience combined with some scarcity you should have no problem getting sales !!!
A livestream of models wearing your new garments - Whats the theme? the location? Make your own fun backdrop etc.

Also plan some pre-launch activities to build excitement:

Giveaways
Competitions
Encourage your audience to share your content with incentives
Lives - You could do weekly lives on the run-up to launch day.

Four to Six weeks ahead of your launch you could follow this checklist:

Contact the print media, bloggers etc that you have been building relationships with. Let them know what you are doing and invite them to your launch.

Send traditional postcards to the print media. You can use a cute illustration or collage for your card. Or, as soon as one garment is ready you can take a stylised photo.

Contact everyone in your email list (Module 2 had some links to software to create your list)

Start implementing your 30 day pre-LAUNCH RAMP-UP CONTENT CALENDAR

Talk about it in your blog or podcast.

Use Instagram & Facebook Ads. Its a good idea and more cost effective to grow your audience organically first before starting ads because you can then use that list to create a “lookalike audience” that will target similar people. Mailchimp has a beginners guide to Ads: https://mailchimp.com/resources/how-to-build-your-email-list/ but if you’re serious about using ads you might want to employ an ads specialist as it can get fairly complex.

You will need to post reminders to all your socials and also the print media, bloggers etc perhaps two weeks before, two days before, 1 day and 1 hour before the launch, using your countdown timer.

The day after your event go live on IG showing your excitement at all the orders you placed on opening night / day, and of course the products that are now available to the public.

MODULE 7

LESSON 6

PHOTOSHOOTS

PHOTOSHOOTS

Great photographs are essential to selling your garments on and off line. There are two types of photoshoots:

E-commerce or for press - This needs good lighting a plain white background and the focus is on the products, NOT the styling.

Campaign shoot - This is a very stylised shoot around the theme of your collection.

If you’re organised you could do them both on the same day saving time and money.

If you have sponsorship links with a hair or make-up company sometimes they will provide their services for free.

The location for a campaign shoot should suit the vibe of your garments i.e. a beach scene for beachwear, a relaxed home scene for loungewear, a picnic scene for relaxed summer garments etc. Check if you need permits. Most parks will require you to have a permit.

That they have the right Personality for your brand
The right Aesthetic
The right Body shape
That your clothes fit them well. This is extremely important as no-one will by ill fitting garments.
That they can move in the way required for your narrative.

Accessories could be propped on a piece of nature, on an object in your home etc. Get creative . You just need really good lighting.

Choose a date that suits everyone and on the day be sure to provide plenty of subsistence as a photoshoot can be a long tiring day!

Video record the shoot to add to your marketing kit, so that you can edit little bits out for your behind the scenes content.

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